Former President Donald Trump speaks to the media at a Washington hotel, Tuesday, Jan. 9, 2024, after attending a hearing before the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals at the federal courthouse in Washington.
The one-month gap between when the appeals court heard arguments and when it issued its ruling has already created uncertainty about the timing of any trial in a calendar-jammed election year, with the judge overseeing the case last week canceling the March 4 date that was initially set and not immediately scheduling a replacement one. The judges gave Trump until February 12 to ask the Supreme Court to pause the ruling.
“Presidential immunity against federal indictment would mean that, as to the President, the Congress could not legislate, the Executive could not prosecute and the Judiciary could not review. We cannot accept that the office of the Presidency places its former occupants above the law for all time thereafter,” the judges wrote.
The appeals court took center stage in the immunity dispute after the Supreme Court in December said it was at least temporarily staying out of it, rejecting a request from Smith’s team to take up the matter quickly and issue a speedy ruling. But the court could yet still decide to act on a Trump team appeal, adding to the uncertainty of a trial date.
But Smith’s team has said that no such immunity exists in the U.S. Constitution or in prior cases and that, in any event, Trump’s actions weren’t part of his official duties. The case was argued before Judges Florence Pan and J. Michelle Childs, appointees of Biden, a Democrat, and Karen LeCraft Henderson, who was named to the bench by President George H.W. Bush, a Republican.
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